


The Long Distance

by takadainmate



Category: Batman (Comics), Nightwing (Comics)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-10
Updated: 2017-01-10
Packaged: 2018-09-16 14:42:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9276485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/takadainmate/pseuds/takadainmate
Summary: Down here they're not Batman and Nightwing. They’re Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson. But they still fight.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pentapus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pentapus/gifts).



It’s the darkness that gets to him.

Dick had stopped feeling the cold hours ago. Now it’s like his hands and legs have turned to stone; heavy and clumsy when he tries to walk. Or more like wade. Every time he trips he feels something like a curious itch in his palms where they hit the rock all around them as he tries to steady himself. He should probably feel pain. 

But worse than any of it is that he can’t see.

His light had been lost well before they’d even escaped and Bruce was conserving what little power he had left. They couldn’t have it on anyway, unless they wanted to give themselves away. 

So darkness it is, thick and heavy around them. If there was light, Dick thinks, he’d be able to see his breath; the water around their ankles; the tunnel way; the way out. He only knows Bruce is there, right ahead of him, because he can hear the soft splashing as Bruce tramps through water. Dick wonders how hard it is for him to walk like that; to ignore decades of training and self-discipline and just make noise. There’s no hesitancy in Bruce’s steps though; no fear. He isn’t clumsy the way Dick is. 

If Dick closes his eyes it’s the same as if he opens them and either way he’s starting to think he can see shapes forming in the dark that aren’t Bruce and he knows aren’t there but they freak him out anyway. The shapes shift and move like oil on water and Dick has never known darkness like it.

The closest he can get, maybe, was those first nights he’d spent at the Wayne Manor. Then, that old house had seemed like some kind of ancient dungeon that Dick had been thrown into so everyone could just forget he existed. The walls and the floorboards creaked and clanged, doors almost too heavy to open and everywhere grey and black and white lace that just made Dick think of funerals. It was everything the circus wasn’t; no colour; no life. 

That first night, Dick remembers, he hid under the bed covers and thought he was going mad because he kept thinking he could hear his Mom calling his-

“Dick.”

The sound of Bruce’s voice is loud, even though he’s whispering. Dick is glad for it.

“Are you hearing me?”

“Yeah,” Dick tries to say, but his throat is dry, despite the shallow river their wading through, all the water running down the walls of the tunnel, and it comes out more like a cough. “Yeah,” he tries again.

“You need to stay focused,” Bruce says. If Dick had a penny for every time he’d heard that he’d have almost as much money as Bruce.

He should know better. Dick knows he has to be _here_ and _now_ , not back then, not anywhere else. Feet in front. Cover your back. But Dick can’t think of any excuse, or any reason why things are kind of a mess in his head and all he can think about are long, dark corridors and long, cold Gotham nights huddled in alleyways that smell of filth. He can’t focus. Instead, Dick says, “It’s dark.”

There’s a pause, a long pause, and Dick imagines he can hear scratching somewhere behind them. He thinks they should be moving; they should be _running_ , though he can’t remember who from. 

Then, he feels Bruce’s hands on his arms, holding him tightly, and it’s so warm the touch prickles, burns across his skin. It reminds Dick of the cold.

“It’s just us down here,” Bruce says. “And I can’t see you, so you have to tell me what’s wrong.” 

Usually by now Bruce would have gotten out his night vision glasses, scanned him to within an inch of his life and pronounced him unfit and out of practice; _That’s what being a cop does to you Dick_ , he’d say. _You’ve lost your edge._

“I’m fine.” Dick’s reply is automatic.

Bruce makes a sound that might actually be a growl. 

His hands are suddenly gone from Dick’s arms and shifts uncomfortably in his heavy jacket, missing the warmth – the strength behind it – but not wanting to admit that to anyone, least of all himself. He feels light-headed, or maybe heavy-headed. He just wants to sit down.

There is shuffling; a clicking sound and then, excruciatingly, bright light is shining in Dick’s eyes and he rears backwards to try and escape it, his balance is all wrong and he almost tips over but Bruce grabs him again and Dick remembers how to stand. He keeps his eyes shut tight.

“Jesus, Dick,” Bruce hisses. 

Dick grits his teeth at the prodding he feels against the side of his head. 

“Bruce,” Dick says, and wants to tell him to stop it or maybe to fuck off but knows he’ll just be ignored. 

“Your head is bleeding,” Bruce is saying. That would explain the weird feeling in his brain, Dick thinks. 

“Do you remember when it happened?” Bruce asks. 

It’s easy to guess at the look Bruce is giving him right now; stern mixed with impatient with a side of disappointment. It’s weird though. They’ve been stood still for so long. It’s never been Bruce’s style to linger like this. Over the year’s Dick’s gotten pretty good at guessing what Batman’s thinking, but this is a plan he can’t guess at. Except, Dick remembers, down here they're not Batman and Nightwing. They’re Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson. 

“Before we were running,” Dick starts and has to think. There was a brightly lit room, and there were people, and Bruce was saying, “Leave him out of this,” but someone laughed and said, “He’s half the equation here.” 

“Someone was doing something,” Dick tells Bruce. 

Bruce’s fingers trace along Dick’s hairline. 

“I don't know what they were doing,” Bruce admits. “I couldn't see.”

Something Batman would never admit, but this is Bruce. Bruce made mistakes. Bruce was allowed to make mistakes. 

Carefully, Dick opens his eyes because the darkness is too much and even if it hurts he needs to see Bruce’s face. There are no layers between them here. 

Behind them, in front of them, all around them Dick can hear splashing; the familiar clicking of weapons being loaded. This time he’s almost certain it’s not his imagination. Muffled voices are shouting, “We’ve found them.”

“They won't get us,” Bruce promises. “Even like this.” 

Like humans, Dick knows he means, rather than stories to frighten children and criminals. They didn’t bring anything to link them to those lives because Bruce had said not to; he’d known what they were walking in to even if Dick hadn’t. And Dick would like to be able to tell himself that he wouldn't do this again; that he wouldn't follow Batman – follow _Bruce_ \- into some situation he knew nothing about but he knew he would. Every fucking time. 

But Bruce had said he _didn’t know_. He hadn’t known it would be like this.

So what would Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson do if they were trapped in an underground cave system, water running through their boots and down their backs and dripping off their hair? What would they do with minimal light and no heat and no map and guys with guns coming for them?

“We run,” Dick says.

Bruce’s smile is one Dick recognises; that smile Batman gets sometimes before he goes into battle and knows he’s going to win. “We run.”


End file.
